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First post, by VirtuaIceMan

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The installer won't work (it tries to install DirectX3, fails, then says the game can't be installed as a result). The fix is easy, simply copy the RCHAL folder off the CD-ROM to your PC (I'm using the SoftKey/Roadshow Interactive budget release), you can then run the game from the RALLY95.EXE file. This is better than the actual installer, which adds links to CompuServe(!) and has no uninstall mechanism!

Initially the game will show a pop-up to say no prefs file is found, this is correct.

If you run the game with no compatibility (on my Win8.1 at least) it'll stop shortly after launch with a pop up saying "DirectDraw Error : cannot attach pal to front buffer UNDEF DD ERROR".

So, apply Win95 compatibility to RALLY95.EXE. It'll now show the initial loading screens, then it should play an opening video from the CD-ROM, however it instead crashes with a message "DirectDraw Error : resize UNDEF. DD ERROR". Now from running the game in VMware Player, I can see it resizes the screen to play the video, perhaps to a resolution that's not supported? I don't think there's any way to skip the videos either (there's one on startup and one when exiting the game).

I tried DXGL (sort of - just put ddraw and the config file of DXGL in the game folder) but that just shows black screens (never really played with DXGL much yet though). I tried Dege's DirectX wrapper, and that errored right away with the initial error I found.

Note: often when crashing, the game still runs in memory, so fire up Task Manager to kill it (under Background Processes).

If this is a game that will only work on a virtual machine, then fair enough. However I noticed that the CD audio (should play on the menu screen, and you can swap tracks by pressing C on the menu screen) doesn't play, even in Win98SE via VMware Player. A little side quirk anyway.

So, anyone got any Compatibility tips? Or a copy of the game to have a go with? It's probably out there on the net to download, if anyone wants a go. There doesn't seem to be any registry strings installed, although if you install the game via the START.EXE on the CD (a 16bit stub so needs a virtual machine) it will create a folder with an ini file in for the game, but it doesn't seem to contain anything useful, as the game works fine without it).

My PC spec: Win10 64bit, i7-4970K (not overclocked), KFA2 GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER, Creative Soundblaster ZXr, 16GB RAM, Asus Z97-A motherboard, NZXT 410 case, ROG Swift GSYNC monitor

Reply 2 of 4, by VirtuaIceMan

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Not yet; that seems to only improve games that work already. I prefer to use Application Compatibility Toolkit to apply the fixes directly instead, as it's more future proof (hopefully) when DX12 comes out.

My PC spec: Win10 64bit, i7-4970K (not overclocked), KFA2 GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER, Creative Soundblaster ZXr, 16GB RAM, Asus Z97-A motherboard, NZXT 410 case, ROG Swift GSYNC monitor

Reply 4 of 4, by VirtuaIceMan

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This is now FIXED! Thanks to Dege for deducing the game was enumerating the list of resolutions/refresh rates badly and messing up it's own preference files...

To fix it, add dgVoodoo to the game folder (need WIP6 or newer, see the thread here for the .dll files: dgVoodoo 2 for DirectX 11) then replace the RALLY95.EXE with the attached version (thanks to Dege for fixing it!).

Note: the background black colour in the menus/videos often renders in the wrong colour (maroon or blue) but the game is playable and looks fine!

Filename
RallyChallenge1_2_Patch.zip
File size
102.64 KiB
Downloads
100 downloads
File comment
Made by Dege!
File license
Fair use/fair dealing exception

My PC spec: Win10 64bit, i7-4970K (not overclocked), KFA2 GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER, Creative Soundblaster ZXr, 16GB RAM, Asus Z97-A motherboard, NZXT 410 case, ROG Swift GSYNC monitor